


The Greatest Gift

by phoebesmum



Category: Sports Night
Genre: Angst, Christmas, Drabble Sequence, Episode Related, Family, Family Rydell, Multi, Post-Canon, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-23
Updated: 2009-11-23
Packaged: 2017-10-03 15:23:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,207
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19562
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/phoebesmum/pseuds/phoebesmum
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Seven times Dan was almost completely happy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Greatest Gift

**Author's Note:**

> Written for catwalksalone, Christmas, 2006. Six one-and-a-half drabbles and one triple.

** _1971_ **

"When's Mom coming home?" he'd asked David, asked Karen, asked his father, several times a night, every night for a week. And every night, David or Karen would say, "Soon, Danny. It's okay, don't worry."

His dad, mostly, would just frown. He frowned a lot nowadays. Dan didn't know why, and it scared him. But he missed his mom, so he kept on asking.

Then one day Dad drove up in the car, and there was Mom, sitting right next to him. Dan thought he might burst from the excitement. He wriggled out of Karen's arms and raced down the front steps to welcome Mom home.

But what was that that Mom was carrying?

She held it out to him. "Danny?" she said, softly. "Look! It's your little brother. Isn't he beautiful?"

Dan looked at the ugly, red, shrivelled bundle, then back up at his mother, and burst into tears.

***

** _1980_ **

School is easy for Dan. Too easy. He's blessed with a good memory for names, dates, facts, plus a gift for mimicry that means that he can style any paper he needs to write to suit whatever that particular teacher wants.

So, lazy by nature, he coasts, getting good grades while doing as little work as possible. He'd rather be climbing trees, playing ball, sailing boats, flying kites. Anything but schoolwork.

But you can't fool everyone, and there are one or two teachers who've caught on, who'll grade him for effort, not result. That's meant one or two 'B's along the way.

Not this term. He's bringing home a report card filled with straight 'A's. And, sure enough, his mom's thrilled.

She tries to show it to his father. He glances at it, and snorts.

"Not bad, I suppose," is all he says. And he goes back to his newspaper.

***

** _1983_ **

Lindsay Callaghan. Blonde and luscious, and easy as all get-out. So rumour has it. But, apparently, tragically immune to Dan's charms.

Well – she _is_ a year older.

But Dan's not a quitter. He's smart enough not to push, not to creep her out, but he makes sure she knows he's around. He buys her Cokes, lights her cigarettes, lends her his jacket when she's caught out in the rain. He defends her when he hears another boy bad-mouthing her, and that, when she hears about it, tips the scales in his favour.

Turns out, the 'easy' thing? True.

She's patient, and clever, and can do amazing things with her fingers. Screw the Bar Mitzvah: _today_, he becomes a man!

He rolls off her, sticky and sated, and smiles at her. She smiles back, in a way that reminds him disconcertingly of his mother.

"Your first time?" is all she says.

***

** _1987_ **

He's made it. He's free. Free of his mother's clinging need, his father's disapproval. From now on, when he goes back home it'll just be to visit, touch base, check on his brother. If anything can take the shine off his good mood, it's the faint twinge of guilt at leaving Sam alone to deal with dysfunction and misery. But it won't be for long: only a few years, just till Dan graduates. Then he'll get a job, find an apartment, and Sam can come live with him. Dan knows he's smart, he's got a great future ahead of him; he'll be able to earn enough for the both of them, while Sam fends off offers from government think-tanks and the CIA.

It hasn't been easy for either of them, but better times are waiting right around the corner. Count on it. Just wait and see.

Then the telephone rings.

***

** _1999_ **

It's love. He knows his friends are sceptical, cynical, but what do they know? Not a damn thing. They don't know Rebecca; when they look at her, they don't see what he sees. They don't understand – how can they? – that she's broken, that her fragments patch the missing pieces of his own life; that, loving her, he can make both of them whole.

If the people who know him were a hard sell, Rebecca herself was even tougher. He knew she wasn't impervious as she pretended; he knows about walls. He's built enough of them in his time. But she'd convinced herself: she wouldn't take risks, wouldn't be loved, couldn't be, and certainly not by Dan.

But tonight the walls come tumbling down. There might be trumpets.

(Only, as he walks her to the lobby, he catches Casey's eye. And his steps falter. How had he never seen _that_ before?)

***

** _2000_ **

Reprieve, salvation, and, all around him, celebration. Dan makes sure he's the heart and soul of it; they don't need skeletons at this feast. He'll laugh and drink, dance with Kim and Natalie, hug Dana, hug Isaac.

He won't hug Casey. They'll sit at separate tables, meet at the bar or working the room, stop to smile and joke, high-five, punch arms, slap backs. Like buddies do.

Normal guys. Friends, colleagues. The kind of guys who can make it on their own. Because that's what they are.

Only that. He'd been a fool ever to think that maybe, just maybe, there was something more; some other, deeper level, something they'd never dared explore, always a little too far to touch, too distant to see. Always a possibility.

Just his imagination. He'll work on that.

Meantime: they'll party. Their jobs are safe, their futures assured. What can possibly go wrong now?

***

** _Now_ **

He hates the holidays. Hates Chanukah the most, the way it's been thrust into the spotlight as a faux-Christmas. But then, everything's fake out here: fake tans and teeth, false faces and double-edged smiles. California was supposed to be the answer, but all it's done is raise a whole new set of questions.

Like _what am I doing here?_ and _where am I going?_

That last makes him smile, bitter and ironic. _Quo vado_, indeed.

He shouldn't complain. He's got a lot to be thankful for and, only a month ago, he dutifully stood up at the dinner table and recited the entire list: health, career, success, his sister and friends. He is thankful; he has a great life. Really. But it's late, he's tired, and it's raining – which, by the way, he thinks there's actually a law against that – and, right at this moment, all he can think of are wasted opportunities and absent friends.

A good night's sleep, and he'll be fine in the morning. He knows. This isn't the first time he's been through this.

He swings open the wrought-iron gate to his condo and freezes, hand still on the latch. In the porchlight shadows a figure's waiting, hair and coat glistening damp; shoulders hunched, hands in pockets, a hesitant smile, unsure of its welcome.

So: it's Christmas, after all. A time for giving. A time to receive.

A time to reconcile. And to accept the gifts that he's been given.

(The gifts most treasured are always those least expected.)

He moves, finally, faking a confidence that he knows fools nobody. He turns his key in the lock and glances back with a smile he doesn't have to fake.

"Don't be a stranger," he says; doesn't wait for an answer.

The door swings closed quietly behind them.

***


End file.
